ICE Union: ‘Thousands of Illegal Aliens Are Being Released into U.S.’ with ‘Catch and Release in Overdrive’

File Photo: John Moore/Getty ImagesJOHN BINDER13 Mar 2019

The National Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Council says agents are being “overwhelmed” by mass, unchecked illegal immigration to the United States.

In a letter to President Trump this week, the ICE union wrote that the Catch and Release program — whereby border crossers and illegal aliens are swiftly released into the interior of the U.S. after being detained — is in “overdrive,” as agents are forced to release illegal aliens en masse to make space for new border crossers who, likewise, will eventually be released.

The ICE union letter notes:

As you know, every day thousands of illegal aliens are being released into the United States by your Administration. ‘Catch and Release’ is not just happening, it’s in overdrive. Catch and release must continue as ICE doesn’t have sufficient custody space to hold the massive number of family units illegally entering the United States every day. DHS resources on the border are overwhelmed. Political games in Washington, D.C. have rendered the United States completely incapable of controlling its southern border. [Emphasis added]

…

Under the current circumstances, CBP Officers and Border Patrol Agents must apprehend hundreds to thousands of immigration violators each day, and process the cases of those they apprehend, to include issuing notices requiring an appearance before an immigration judge. Again, as there is no custody space, the hundreds to thousands apprehended each day by CBP must be released to charitable organizations that facilitate their travel to locations throughout the U.S. In a nutshell, this is ‘Catch and Release.’ And this is where the utter nonsense begins. [Emphasis added]

The ICE union also explained an internal process of Catch and Release wherein ICE agents are technically tasked with releasing all border crossers and illegal aliens into the interior of the country, a policy that union officials write is “extensive, and costly.”

In one instance, ICE union officials said between 500 to 700 border crossers were brought to an ICE border office by Border Patrol agents on a daily basis “for the sole purpose of serving the release document” that will allow the migrants to be released into the country.

“If you or your staff disagree with the assessment of ICE officers serving in the field on the southern border … we invite you to personally come to the southern border and speak directly to our veteran ICE officers in the field so that you can explain to them why they are incorrect in their assessment that ICE resources on the border are being grossly mismanaged by DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and Acting ICE Director Ronald Vitiello,” the letter states.

As Breitbart News has reported, the recent expansion of Catch and Release by the White House has resulted in large influxes of border crossers and illegal aliens being released into the country with only the promise that they will return to court for their immigration hearings.

While the Catch and Release program continues, the experts project that illegal border crossings for this calendar year will be more than three times what they were in 2017 and nearly double last year’s total crossings. The projection predicts there to be more than 840,000 illegal border crossings this year, though Nielsen predicts about 900,000 crossings for the year.

John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Follow him on Twitter at @JxhnBinder.